Photo-Illustration: Courtesy of HBO
Whether you’re grabbing a pole on the G train or going on a ski vacation, cold fingers are never pleasant. As many types of gloves as there are — touchscreen or fleece or leather — there are even more brands and styles to choose from within those categories. To find the best versions no matter what you’re looking for, we talked to gear experts, stylists, and professional snowboarders about their favorites. We also consulted our data to determine which gloves our readers have purchased the most over the past three years. The pair of gloves with the most reader purchases since 2019 was named the best overall. The cheapest pair of gloves with the most reader purchases was named the best less expensive. The remaining gloves were either recommended by experts or among our ten most-bought gloves.
Best overall | Best less expensive | Best leather | Best (less expensive) leather | Best insulated | Best insulated with touchscreen | Best skiing | Best running | Best heated | Best mittens | Best convertible mittens
What we’re looking for
Material: The material of the glove will tell you a lot about the best use case and the level of warmth you can expect. Leather, for example, is windproof but not so good with damp conditions. Polyester or fleece will dry quickly and let your fingers breathe, but that also means it’s not the most windproof.
Fit: If you’ll be using your hands a lot while wearing gloves and need to maintain dexterity, you’ll want a slim pair with a tight fit. If you’re not going to be using your fingers much and just want to keep your hands warm, a thick, bulky pair may be your best choice. If you need warmth and some dexterity, you’ll want a pair with medium thickness that packs in warmth but still gives you fingers some freedom. We’ve noted below whether each glove is thin (second skin), medium (warmer, but not so thick you lose dexterity), or bulky (minimal dexterity).
Price: There are three different price points that we decided on, denoted as $, $$, or $$, respectively: under $20, under $50, over $50.
OZero Deerskin Suede -20°F Winter Gloves
$15
now 32% off
$15
Fleece | Medium | $
A glove isn’t good if it doesn’t do the main thing it’s made to do: keep your fingers warm. So when we went in search of the very best gloves, we focused on function over form. These unisex gloves from OZero are first and foremost warm, which is likely why over 3,600 readers have purchased them since 2019, making them our most-purchased glove. They’re lined with a patented Heatlok thermal layer that can withstand temperatures of up to -20 degrees Fahrenheit (though the company notes that’s the extreme temperature for the gloves, and 0 degrees F is the comfortable temperature). The gloves’ exterior is made with a grippy deerskin suede palm and a fluffy polar-fleece top, both of which add warmth and utility. Deerskin has great grip and durability, and it doesn’t harden in the cold, so you can wear these for everything from riding a motorcycle to shoveling the driveway. The polar fleece, meanwhile, is soft and flexible, making these gloves just as great for daily wear in the colder months. Amazon reviewers agree: Of the over 8,000 reviews, 5,200 are five-star, with reviewers calling the gloves soft, comfortable, and a great everyday winter glove.
$15
at Amazon$15
at AmazonAchiou Winter Knit Touchscreen Gloves
From $9
now 25% off
From $9
Knit Polyester | Thin | $
It’s hard to find a good pair of gloves for less than $10, so while these gloves from Achiou may not seem much cheaper than our best overall pick, they’re the cheapest pair on our list of the ten most-purchased gloves (and, we should note, they are over 40 percent cheaper than the best overall gloves). But they’re not the best just because of their price. Since 2019, readers have bought them 3,466 times, making them our second most-sold pair. Made of a knit acrylic fabric with a wool lining, they’re warm enough for day-to-day winter use, and the knit fabric is stretchy enough that you maintain full dexterity. What makes these gloves especially great for daily winter wear is the touchscreen capability on the thumb, forefinger, and middle finger. (Most gloves only have two touchscreen-capable fingers.) The touchscreen fingertips can be kind of finicky, reviewers say, and the gloves aren’t warm enough for long-term wear in the extreme cold, but for the price, they’re a great glove for running errands in the winter, which is why over 27,500 reviewers have given them a five-star rating.
From $9
at AmazonFrom $9
at AmazonHestra Elisabeth Glove
$125
$125
Leather | Thin | $$$
Because it’s waterproof and durable, leather is a great winter glove material. And when we went on the hunt for the best women’s gloves, three experts recommended leather gloves from Hestra, a company based in Hestra, Sweden, where all the glove design and development is done. Ari Gefen, a buyer at Westerlind, likes these Elisabeth gloves, saying they’re “exceedingly well-made, warm, and look amazing. They’re dressy but not too fussy, the perfect city glove.” They’re made with hairsheep leather and lined with 100 percent wool, so they’re plenty warm, and they come in ten beautiful colors — both neutrals and brighter hues like lilac.
$125
at Hestra$120
at NisoloCarhartt Women’s Quilts Insulated Breathable Glove with Waterproof Wicking Insert
From $25
Polyester | Bulky | $$
If you live in an extra-chilly climate or do a lot of outdoor activities in the winter, you’ll probably need a thick pair of gloves, and these from Carhartt are our third most-purchased gloves since 2019, with 3,448 sold. They’re also well reviewed on Amazon — they have over 3,000 five-star ratings — especially among reviewers who live in infamously cold places like Minnesota and the Rockies. The gloves’ outer shell is made of durable ripstop taffeta and reinforced with a synthetic palm for more durability, so they’ll hold up to hours of shoveling snow. Inside, they’re insulated with warm Poly-Fil, Carhartt’s moisture-wicking FastDry lining, and a waterproof insert, all of which keep your hands dry and warm throughout hours of outdoor activity. The elastic fleece cuff is tight enough to keep moisture out but stretchy enough to easily get the gloves on and off.
From $25
at Amazon$25
at carharttOzero -20°F Coldproof Insulated Work Glove
$19
Fleece | Medium | $
While many of the gloves on this list are touchscreen compatible, none are as warm as this pair from OZero, the brand that makes our best overall glove. Like the OZero deerskin glove, these are made to withstand extremely cold temperatures — up to -20 degrees. Unlike the deerskin glove, these have goatskin-leather touchscreen fingertips on the thumb and index finger so you can text and navigate without exposing your fingers to the cold. Readers purchased them over 2,100 times in the past three years, making them our seventh-most-purchased gloves. Their windproof polar fleece and imitation-lambswool lining keep hands warm and comfortable throughout outdoor winter activities, and a polyurethane layer makes them water-resistant, too. And if you’re worried about navigating through winter with soft yet slippery fleece, the palms have a cowhide leather patch for better grip so you don’t drop your phone (or anything else) in the snow.
$19
at Amazon$19
at AmazonTrailHeads Women’s Power Stretch Touchscreen Running Gloves
From $30
From $30
Polyester | Thin | $$
When you run in the winter, you need a pair of gloves that keep your hands warm without weighing them down. This pair, made of polyester-blend fabric called Polartec Power Stretch Pro, is our eighth most-purchased pair of gloves since 2019, with nearly 1,800 pairs bought. The fabric’s smooth, wind-resistant outer layer and soft, moisture-wicking inner layer work together to keep your hands warm and dry on cold days without overheating. The fabric is stretchy to allow for full dexterity, and the forefinger and thumb are touchscreen compatible. The gloves also have silicone palm grips so you don’t drop your phone while you jog. The gloves are well reviewed on Amazon, with nearly 1,500 five-star ratings — many of them from avid runners who say these are the best running gloves they’ve owned.
From $30
at AmazonFrom $30
at AmazonCarhartt Women’s Quilts Insulated Breathable Mitt with Waterproof Wicking Insert
From $28
Polyester | Bulky | $$
Mittens are warmer than gloves because they have fewer seams for heat to escape out of and they keep all your fingers together to share body heat. So if you won’t be doing anything that requires finger dexterity, mittens are the best choice for keeping your hands warm. And these from Carhartt — the mitten version of the quilted insulated glove above — were our fifth-most-purchased glove (or mitten) in the past three years. Like their glove counterparts, they’re well reviewed on Amazon, too, with over 1,700 five-star reviews. They have all the same qualities of the insulated glove, including the ripstop shell, reinforced palm, FastDry lining, waterproof insert, and stretch-fleece cuff. But they’re arguably even warmer thanks to the design.
From $28
at Amazon$25
at Thiesen'sMetog Suede Thinsulate Thermal Insulation Mittens
$15
Wool Blend | Medium | $
Our ninth-most-sold pair of gloves-slash-mittens since 2019, with nearly 1,700 sold, these mittens are made of a blend of warm materials. They have a half-wool, half-polyester outer shell, a fleece interior, and 3M Thinsulate insulation. All of that makes them very warm — and incredibly comfortable, thanks to the soft interior. Best of all for those who don’t want to give up dexterity, these are a glove-mitten hybrid, with half-length gloves that can be hidden beneath the mitten top and only opened for quick moments.
$15
at Amazon$15
at AmazonOur experts
• Jake Allison, gear expert at Backcountry
• Jasmine Caccamo, celebrity stylist
• Aimee Fuller, Olympic snowboarder
• Ari Gefen, buyer at Westerlind
• Liz Lamanna, manager and buyer at Panda Sport
• Taylor Manson, visual specialist at REI
• Megan Ann Wilson, designer, stylist, and creative consultant
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